Mobile Navigation

Search form

You are here

Cambridge Sourdough

Cambridge Sourdough

From Bertinet's "Crust"

I am very new to bread baking, and it took 3 tries before I got a feel for the ferment/flour/dough ratio, this was my first success. I have done a few batches since, and they are beginning to be a little more consistent. I feel like a proud papa :)

is great, but there are these slow-motion transistion with pretty music and hands-through-dough montages that border on the food equivalent of Skinemax movies from the 80's... though Bertinet is handsome, he's no Shannon Tweed :)

For your kind comments. I really have to credit the yeast more than anything else. I am still popping out sourdough once or twice a week, but my challenge starting today is the baguette recipe from the book. I have started reading the Hamelman, which already seems like it will be an enormous help, but so far I have run into the sad fact that

1) shaping baguettes is hard

2) moving baguettes is harder than moving boules. Unless you like crooked baguettes.

I imagine it is one of those things that only practice will perfect, but any baguette shaping/moving from the peel tips would be appreciated. I'll be searching this site for those already posted.

Was this Bertinet's basic sourdough recipe? If so, could you describe the taste? He has some different approaches so I am wondering how they work out: the whole grain that he adds is spelt; his levain is refreshed at a fairly low rate ; he uses a high percentage of levain as sponge; and there is also a very long fermentation at room temperature. Are the loaves noticeably sour? I might just have to try this formula for myself! Your loaves look very enticing.

Every time I try some new techniques, I learn something new about the art of bread baking.

Sourdough recipe. His doughs are amazingly wet-- not including the levain, it's something like 700g of flour to 650g water. I actually have been doing a retarded rise overnight in the top of my refrigerator-- my kitchen is inconsistently warm/cold (the price of having roommates).

The overnight retarded rise helps slow down the yeast's metabolism, and allows the bacteria to do some of their delicious souring work. I'm lucky, because apparently, the yeasts and bacterias found in cool environments are less likely to taste foul than those in warmer environments.

The loaves are pretty noticeably sour, but not as sour as if I had used a milk-based sourdough starter. I had one going for a while, baked it off once, and just didn't keep up with it, as I was buying milk only for the starter, and eventually, old milk + old starter = not a pleasant smell in the fridge...

I feed the starter every three days-- how long do you usually wait to refresh?

I just baked Bertinet's basic sourdough formula. It had tons of ovenspring. I baked it under a cloche, and it got so large, that it oozed a bit, forming a real "bell" shape. I didn't do the final proofing quite as long as recommended, as mine rose substantially in about 13.5 hours. Lots of crackling and singing when it came out of the oven.

All original site content copyright 2015 The Fresh Loaf unless stated otherwise. Content posted by community members is their own. The Fresh Loaf is not responsible for community member content. If you see anything inappropriate on the site or have any questions, contact me at floydm at thefreshloaf dot com. This site is powered by Drupal and Mollom. It is part of the Federated Media Publishing - Food channel. Click here for advertising information.